The Hindu Business Line : Singapore Airlines arm joins hands with Air India

Mr Subhas Menon, Regional Vice-President, West Asia and Africa, Singapore Airlines, and Mr C.W. Foo, General Manager India, Singapore Airlines, at a press conference in Bangalore on Monday. — G.R.N. Somashekar

Our Bureau

Bangalore, Oct. 1 One of Singapore Airlines’ subsidiaries has entered into a joint venture with Air India to offer ground handling services for the Bangalore International Airport.

An official with Singapore Airlines told a news conference that Singapore Airport Terminal Services (SATS) and Air India’s joint venture enterprise will offer ground handling services at the Bangalore International Airport which is expected to be opened early next year.

Another venture of Singapore Airlines’ SAEC (Singapore Airlines Engineering Company) is already in talks with low-cost domestic carrier GoAir for setting up a MRO (maintenance, repair & overhaul) centre in the country.

The airline’s Regional Vice-President for West Asia and Africa, Mr Subhas Menon, said 5 per cent of the total number of passengers came from India.

“Our growth rate in India is between 15 per cent and 20 per cent,” he said.

Additional flights

The airline’s General Manager for India, Mr C.W. Foo, said the airline will also commence three additional flights from Bangalore taking the total number of such flights to 10 times a week.

In addition to the daily night flights, there will be daylight flights every Monday, Friday and Saturday.

The airline has also announced special economy fare of Rs 12,000 from Bangalore-Singapore and the offer will be open from October 29 to December 31.

Mr Menon said two passengers from Chennai had successfully bid for seats for the inaugural flight of world’s largest aircraft A380 from Singapore to Sydney during the middle of October.

The airline offered 75 per cent of the 471 seats for bidding.

The winning bids ranged from $580 to $100,000 per seat.

The airline collected an amount of $1.9 million from auctioning these seats which was later given out to charities.

Singapore Airlines has placed orders for 19 A380s and six as options. Mr Menon, however, ruled out the airline’s plans to fly A380 into India.

“We will consider deploying the aircraft once we get volumes,” he said.